Sojourn in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, and Excursions into the Surrounding Region
Bethlehem on the Lecha or Lehigh – Dr. Saynisch – His solicitude – Natural history specimens – Lecha islands – Lecha Mountain Nazareth Delaware Gap – Easton – Delaware Gap – Pocono Mountains – Tunkhannock and Tobyhanna Creek – Beaver and Bear Creek – Susquehanna Valley – Wilkes-Barre – Falls of Solomon Creek – Neskopeck Valley – Lausanne – Nesquehoning Valley – Mauch Chunk on the Lecha – Collieries – Lecha Valley – Mahoning Creek – Lehigh Valley – Mahoning Gap – Preparations for departure from Bethlehem – Nazareth – Allentown
September 7, 1832
I rode to Nazareth, 10 miles away, with Mr. Gebhard and Pastor Seidel. The road leads in an easterly direction through cultivated areas and isolated oak woods. One passes some dwellings that bear the name Altona (“all too near”), where Moravians also once lived. Then one reaches the Monocacy and the town Hecktown, which bears this name for a peculiar reason, which Bernhard of Weimar has already related.
Nazareth is a friendly town with several streets, which are unpaved, and built with houses rather close together. Here the Brethren have a school for young people with several professors, and the director, Mr. Herrmann, is a pleasant, vigorous, well-educated man. He lives in a nice little house, where, because of lack of time, we did not stay long. Mr. Herrmann was kind enough to take us around and show us the classes; the teachers were all Germans, although instruction is given in English. The building is rather old and not especially roomy. Up on the roof, one has a beautiful, broad view of the entire region toward the blue mountains of the Delaware and the green forests on the Lecha. In the house there is also a small natural history collection with several interesting ethnographic objects from Surinam and the large antlers of a North American bull elk. The garden is pleasant; it has much shade and nice old, tall trees and also a European larch tree that has grown very high. Not far from the garden is the cemetery, which is situated on elevated ground and affords a very beautiful view. The graves lie in rows with flat stones, as in Bethlehem. They are covered with a thick growth of a European plant, Thymus serpyllum. By far the largest number of those buried here were born in Germany. The church is not as large as the one in Bethlehem, but [it is] simple and easy to heat during the winter. Nazareth has 350 inhabitants, an inn, stores, etc., and about sixty young people in the school.
After we had viewed the main objects of interest in Nazareth, Mr. Gebhard took leave of us in order to return to New York. We drove back to Bethlehem after we had bought several additional amphibian rarities. This region has a European quality, but the many wooden fences give it an American character. Pastor Seidel told me he had usually made his way to Nazareth on foot; because of the poor road [he] had looked for an alternate route across the fields but had been forced to climb over seventy-five fences.